Victims of a Brother of Charity who admitted that he could not remember the names of all the boys he had abused expressed their outrage yesterday after it was ruled in a Cork court that the elderly cleric be freed from prison next week
James Kelly, otherwise known as Brother Ambrose, was jailed for 36 years in 1999 for sexually abusing numerous young boys in his care. He is set to be released from prison, having served just three years of the longest ever prison sentence handed down for sexual abuse in Irish legal history.
The Brother of Charity sexually abused orphans and mentally-handicapped children in Galway during the 1960s. He also committed similar offences in the 1940s and 1950s at the Lota children's home in Glanmire, Cork.
One of his victims, Mr John Barrett, said that he was incensed at the decision to release Kelly after such a short period of time.
"I thought justice would be done or be seen to be done."
He described him as a most evil person. "Nobody knows what that man is capable of. I was raped hundreds of times by him. Are we ever going to see justice in this country?"
Mr Barrett said it was time for a specific court to be set up to deal solely with cases of sexual abuse.
He claimed that the decision to grant privacy to the institution which will house Kelly was sending a wrong message to society about who had the upper hand in cases - the abuser or the victim.
Mr Barrett, a member of the Victims' Rights group, said that his life had been under a dark cloud since the day he met Brother Ambrose.
"I haven't really slept for years. I have tried to commit suicide five times because of him. The day I left Lota was the best day of my life.
"Doctors don't see people like him when they are in power. I want to see him do the time he was given. Lots of people are being sexually abused, and is this how it is going to end up for them?"
Mr Alan Carroll, who was in Lota at the age of 14, said that his blood turned cold when he realised that Kelly could be housed in the same county in which he himself lives.
He argued that Kelly should be kept in prison until he fully understood the enormity of the damage he had caused to dozens of boys over the years.
Mr Carroll said that the decision to free the most notorious paedophile in the State on the grounds of old age and frailty was an insult to victims who had suffered years of pain and sorrow as a result of his "evil".
"That fella (Ambrose) could only be two miles from where I live. I will be on guard for as long as I have breath. It is very unfair for the judge to release him on the grounds of his age.
" If I was a judge, I would have kept him in prison until he realised the damage he has done to innocent lives. He terrified me, he threatened and bullied me. I feel a threat has come on me now that he is to be released."
Victims who gathered outside Cork Circuit Criminal Court yesterday spoke emotionally of the devastating impact Kelly had on their lives.
Many of the children abused by Kelly at institutions in Cork and Galway had no living parents and were preyed on because of their vulnerability.
Kelly told the Cork court in 1999 that he very much regretted the abuse and was willing to go to jail.
A helpline set up that year received 96 calls, leading to fresh charges being made against him.
Kelly's health has deteriorated in recent times - he suffers from hip problems and a heart condition and he has renal problems. He has been detained at the prison in The Curragh since 1999.
Sentencing Kelly three years ago, Judge A.G. Murphy said that the victims' experiences of the Brother of Charity had "rendered their lives little short of a permanent crucifixion".